Cover to Cover
by LiveRandom
Summary: We passed from cover to cover... never knowing where we'd end up next. We thought it would be fun and games. We were wrong. "Turn the page... be careful... turn the page... be careful... turn the page... be careful..." AH


** A/N:Bronze and Leon have been asking me to write a story for a while now, so I thought that I would take a crack at it. Obviously this is just the measly prologue, but I have a lot of fun stuff planned and I would love to hear what you guys think. I could not have written this without Bronze and Leon and I thank them whole-heatedly. BTW, if you have not already read the story. City Of Sinners, by Leon I majorly encourage you to do so. **

**Disclaimer: **Stephenie Meyer owns Twilight.

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**Cover To Cover**

_Prologue_

First days were never what you wanted them to be. I kept reminding myself of this fact over and over as I entered the grand brick building. I was immediately drawn to the words 'Forks Public Library,' which stood proudly on top of the structure, letting all know it was there.

I closed my eyes, inhaled in a mouthful of air, and stepped forward. I refused to have this turn out to be like the countless other jobs I had, when I had entered naïve and full of hope of the possibilities that lay before me. This was simply a bill-paying, stacking-the-books position, and I had to accept that before I began.

I slowly walked into the mahogany filled room, and the smell of leather caught my attention immediately. I filled my lungs with it, for if brilliance had a smell, this was it. I glanced around and noticed everything I expected a library to be filled with: walls painted an olive green, sturdy wooden tables, red leathery chairs, landscape art, and of course, an infinite abyss of books. While looking at everything around me in utter fascination, I was stopped as I felt a hand on my shoulder.

"Can I help you?"

I nervously turned around to see an attractive, confident girl in front of me with a large smile plastered along her face.

"My name is Bella Swan. I am supposed to start working here," I said, chuckling shakily at the nervous formality my voice held.

"Oh, yes! You're the newbie. I'm Alice, and it looks like we will be working together."

I sighed at the friendliness of her voice and could not help smiling myself.

"Gia, our manager, is in her office. Take a left at the autobiographies and keep walking until you see a hallway. Her door is the last on the left. Good luck!"

_Good luck? _What was that supposed to mean? I quickly came up with three plausible options for Alice's comment. One, Alice was being friendly and trying to make me feel welcome. Two, Gia was the boss from hell and would maul me when I entered her office. Or three, I was simply being neurotic. Whichever option it was did not seem to matter, as I was entering her office regardless. As soon as I stepped in, a tall, redheaded woman ushered me to a seat and began talking quickly.

"You must be Bella", she said while smiling. Thank God. Now option two can fade from my mind completely.

"I'm quite busy today, Bella, so I'll just give you the basics. Around here, we use the OAR system. Do you know what that is?"

Trying to sound smart, yet not in any way succeeding, I replied, "I think I may have heard of it, but—"

She quickly interrupted me. "OAR stands for 'Organizing, Assisting and Ringing.' We _organize_ the books based on the Dewey Decimal System, we _assist_ our customers, and we _ring_ up their purchases. An OAR is essential to steer the raft of business."

Not laughing out loud at that particular moment was one of the hardest things I have ever done. An OAR was essential to _steer the raft of business?_ If this was such a great business, why couldn't our boat have a motor? I now understood why Alice wished me good luck, as my teeth were clenched and I bit my tongue so I wouldn't smile.

"Yes, the OAR system. I remember it perfectly now," I managed to say, stifling my amusement.

"Good. And you are familiar with the Dewey Decimal System, I assume?" I nodded. "Great. Now you can start your day by organizing the books in the return bin by putting them in their proper places."

I quickly left Gia's office and fumbled around, trying to find the bins she talked about, and quickly made my way to a stack of nearby shelves. Jumping right into my work, I organized the books, flipping through each one as I did so. I glided my hand across the shelves, my fingertips slowly moving across the bindings - savoring each cover as it came to me. The Kids Section, The Self-Help Section, and finally, The Classics.

"You can never go wrong with a classic," I said loudly and then immediately I turned around, expecting to get shushed from an old librarian with cat lady glasses and a scowl on her face. It took me a minute to realize _I_ was the librarian, and I sighed a pang of relief when I understood that I had no cat lady glasses and would not be owning some any time soon.

I browsed the shelf, my eyes catching the title of a book I hadn't read since high school: _The Adventures of Tom Sawyer._ I looked around, and when it was clear that no one was beside me, I found a chair and opened the book, deciding to take a break from the job.

"Great," I laughed at myself quietly. "First day, and I'm already slacking off."

But as soon as I began reading the words, I started to feel numb, as if my body was not with me. I fell to the ground, the book hitting the floor with a thud, but I couldn't see. I felt pain, white hot, and started screaming, but I couldn't hear myself. I couldn't hear anything.

I was scared, shaken to the core. What was wrong with me? Time and space seemed to stop, but after the excruciating minutes passed, the pain seemed to dissipate as well.

My eyes fluttered open, the bright rays of the sun blinding my vision, and I struggled to sit upright. Immediately I noticed I was not where I had been, but rather in what appeared to be the countryside filled with rolling hills and white picket fences. There was no longer any musky books, dusty chairs and dim rooms. Everything was wide open, the smell of brilliance replaced by the flowers growing wildly a few feet away.

I was scared, confused, and quite possible insane, but I was not stupid.

I was in the land of Tom Sawyer.


End file.
